Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah has given the green light to multibillion-rupee projects, including a desalination plant to provide potable water to the Defence Housing Authority (DHA).

He gave the approval while presiding over the PPP policy Board meeting at the CM House on Friday.

The Karachi Water and Sewerage Corporation (KWSC) is set to launch a seawater desalination initiative to supply clean drinking water to residents of Karachi. The project structure had previously been approved in the board’s 40th meeting, and efforts to attract investors are underway.

According to a press release from the CM House, the project will follow a design-build-finance-operate-transfer model, allowing the private partner to finance the initiative in exchange for availability and variable payments.

Additionally, private partners will have the option to establish a facility with a higher capacity of up to 46 million gallons per day to facilitate surplus capacity sales for bottled water.

A Kuwait-based company has shown interest in installing the desalination plant in Sindh. Provincial Planning and Development Minister Nasir Shah informed CM Murad that the DHA is ready to purchase the desalinated water.

He approved the government-to-government (G2G) agreement and instructed the Local Government Department, the water utility, and the PPP unit to finalise the project requirements and move forward with implementation.

The CM also approved the construction of a 17-story technology park at NED University of Engineering and Technology under a public-private partnership model

Officials said that the NED Science and Technology Park is being developed through a G2G arrangement with the same Kuwaiti company. The CM noted that he had already allocated Rs1.7 billion as provincial government equity for the project.